The UN General Assembly on Wednesday adopted six resolutions on “Palestinian and Middle East issues,” ranging from Jerusalem to the United Nations special information program on the question of Palestine. The good news is that Israel still has a smattering of friends at the UN: Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, the Marshall Islands, Nauru, Palau, and the United States (and Israel, of course) voted against; Australia, Cameroon, Honduras, Guatemala, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, Tonga, and Vanuatu abstained. The rest, 153 world nations that include places where you plan to spend your vacation this summer or buy your car, condemned Israel as being responsible for most of the ills of the planet, especially the Middle East.

For instance, Haya al-Duraie, representing Kuwait which in 1991 expelled 400,000 Palestinians into the desert, expressed support for international efforts that were laying the foundation for security and stability in the region. “However,” the ambassador warned, “the faltering peace process continues to present a danger to the Middle East.”

There you have it.

The UN press release on the assembly votes, includes a section dealing with the “Situation in the Middle East.” One would expect this section to deal with the 500,000 Syrians who died and millions who were uprooted in the past six years; with the war between Shiites and Sunnis in Iraq; with Iran’s nuclear threat and its region-wide terrorism; with Egypt’s paralyzing poverty; perhaps with the discriminatory policies of Saudi Arabia. Alas, one would be wrong. According to the UN General Assembly, there are two main issues threatening stability and peace in the Middle East: Israel’s “occupation” of Jerusalem and Israel’s refusal to hand over the Golan Heights to the Assad Regime.

On Jerusalem, the draft resolution called for “respect for the historic status quo at the holy places of Jerusalem,” and in the spirit of respect referred to the focal area of contention only by its Arabic name, “Haram al-Sharif.” The Assembly reiterated its determination that any actions taken by Israel, “the occupying Power,” to impose its laws, jurisdiction and administration on the Holy City of Jerusalem “were illegal and therefore null and void and had no validity whatsoever” – note the double invalidation. It also called on Israel to “immediately cease all such illegal and unilateral measures” and stressed that “a comprehensive, just and lasting solution to the question of the City of Jerusalem should take into account the legitimate concerns of both the Palestinian and Israeli sides.”

At least they called it “Jerusalem” and not Al Quds. One point for the home team.

In its resolution on the “Syrian Golan” the Assembly, in the middle of a raging war between the murderous Assad regime that slaughters its own citizens and ISIS and Al Qaeda affiliates who murder everyone else, demanded that “Israel withdraw from all the occupied territory to the line of 4 June 1967 and called on all parties concerned to exert the necessary efforts to ensure the resumption of the peace process.” It should be noted that this example of raging idiocy received only 103 votes in favor, to 6 against (Canada, Federated States of Micronesia, Israel, Marshall Islands, Palau, United States), with 56 abstentions.

Pheew…

The Permanent Observer of Palestine – who could become the Palestinian Authority’s UN Envoy, should the Obama Administration pull a fast one (so far so good, though) – said the adoption of the six resolutions by an overwhelming majority of United Nations Member States was “a reflection of the longstanding international consensus in favor of achieving a just, lasting and peaceful solution to the question of Palestine,” and “a clear reaffirmation of the international community’s consensus on the two-State solution.”

He then added that “the despair and hopelessness of the Palestinian people is increasing as the fiftieth year of the illegal Israeli occupation approached.”

See you in fifty years?

The representative of Israel said the resolutions had not only failed to promote dialogue or build trust, they had also created an organizational infrastructure that had abused funding to allow anti-Israel activities to take place under the auspices of the United Nations.

She argued that supporting the resolutions and the inherent bias against Israel would not advance the cause of peace, but instead make peace harder to achieve. The “Special Information Program on the Question of Palestine” offers a misleading narrative of the region and circulates prejudiced materials under the banner of the United Nations, undermining the organization’s integrity and impartiality. It was baffling how the United Nations, which continued to face a severe budgetary deficit, had spent approximately $6.5 million a year on bodies that were dedicated solely to promoting the Palestinian narrative.

Loved the part about the resolutions “undermining the organization’s integrity and impartiality.” Who says Israeli diplomats have no sense of humor?

by Ilana Messika
The Jerusalem District Court has Abu Dis resident sentenced Mohammad Badr to 16 years in prison following his conviction for stabbing an Israeli on HaNevi’im Street in Jerusalem last May. One person was wounded in the attack.

Badr was sentenced on three separate counts of attempted murder, possession of a weapon (he was carrying a knife) and illegal entry into Israel.

“According to the facts of the indictment, and on the basis of the confession and conviction, the suspect entered Israel illegally and decided to stab a Jew with the aim of killing him,” the judge stated in the verdict. “The defendant’s actions . . . were very serious, which miraculously did not cause fatal casualties.”

The Court added that Badr’s attack was part of the wave of terror attacks that swept the country beginning in September 2015.

In addition to his 16-year prison term, Badr was also ordered to pay compensation in the amount of NIS 80,000 as part of a plea bargain.

On November 29, 1947, by a vote of 33 for, 13 against, and 10 abstained, the UN General Assembly adopted Resolution 181(II) to partition Mandatory Palestine at the end of the British Mandate in 1948. The Plan was accepted by the Jewish Agency for Palestine, despite the fact that it turned Jerusalem into an international city, outside Jewish control, and carved out an enormous section in the center of the country for the future Arab state.

Arab leaders and governments, on the other hand, rejected the partition plan and declared their unwillingness to accept any form of territorial division.

A civil war, known to Jews as The War of Independence and to Arabs as The Catastrophe, broke out in Mandatory Palestine immediately following the adoption of the Resolution by the General Assembly. Then, at midnight on 14 May 1948, the British Mandate expired, and, a few hours earlier, the Jewish People’s Council approved a proclamation, declaring “the establishment of a Jewish state in Eretz Israel, to be known as the State of Israel.” The 1948 Arab–Israeli War began with an invasion of the fledgling country by the Arab States on May 15 1948. Hundreds of thousands of Arabs fled the country, never to return, eventually losing the entire area they could once declare their own.

Moshe Ma’oz, professor emeritus of Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, explains why the Arabs reject the 1947 partition plan. Noting that some moderate or pragmatic Arabs were prepared to accept a small Jewish state in part of Palestine.

“But the [Husseini family] – not democratically elected but backed by the Arab League – continued to intimidate its moderate brethren and to maintain its uncompromising position against the Jews. Even according to moderate Palestinian intellectuals, this leadership adopted an extreme policy vis-à-vis the idea of two states, thus grossly ignoring the will of the UN and the Great Powers, and leading the Palestinians into war and tragedy.”

“Indeed, this militant syndrome of the Palestinian leadership significantly contributed to preventing a political solution to the Arab-Jewish dispute over Palestine in 1947, as in 1937,” Ma’oz argues. “This syndrome was inspired by an intense Islamic and nationalist ideology, dominated by the Husseini family and in particular, Hajj Amin al Husseini, the charismatic Grand Mufti of Jerusalem and Head of the Supreme Muslim Council.”

“Denying the right of the Jewish-Zionist community to national self-determination even in part of Palestine, the Husseinis periodically used violence and terror against Jews, as well as against the moderate Palestinian Nashashibi faction that for many years cooperated with the Jewish community and acknowledged its national aspirations,” he reiterates, explaining that “this moderate faction, although supported by many families and notables throughout the country, was not as organized, armed, motivated or influential among the younger generation as the Husseinis. Consequently, the moderate/pragmatic Palestinians were unable to neutralize the powerful militant Palestinian nationalist leadership or induce it to accept a political settlement.”

Fifty years after that catastrophic Arab failure, in 1977, the UN declared an International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People, to be celebrated each year on November 29. Special commemorative activities are organized by the Division for Palestinian Rights of the United Nations Secretariat, in consultation with the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People.

One would think that on these commemorative events Arab participants would meditate on and recognize their mistakes of the past, and finally adopt a pragmatic, if not friendly approach to their dominant neighbor, the State of Israel.

“There was no moral or legal basis for that partition, as communicated in UN resolution 181 (II) into a ‘Jewish State’ and an ‘Arab State,'” Baroud writes, pointing out that “Jewish immigrants were granted over 55 percent of the total size of historic Palestine and the ‘Arab State,’ which never materialized, was accorded the rest.”

A quick glance at the map shows that more than half the Jewish portion was awarded in the arid Negev and Arava deserts down south, while the Arab portion was mostly contiguous and captured the bulk of central Mandatory Palestine.

Baroud’s recollection of history is understandably different from the Israeli view: “A few months after that unwarranted partition, well-trained Zionist militias moved from several fronts to ‘secure’ the borders of their promised state, only to take over half of what was designated for the future of the Palestinian state, leaving the indigenous Palestinian Arab population of that land with 22 percent of historic Palestine.”

There were no Arab gangs shooting at Jewish civilians in Baroudi’s narrative, nor is there the invasion by well armed Arab forces from three directions. In the same account, the Jews are “immigrants,” the Arabs “indigenous,” despite the fact that the vast majority of Arabs arrived from all across the Middle East in response to the economic renewal brought by European Jews.

Baroud spells it out: “By adopting a popular Palestinian narrative (not an official one), in which all Palestinians – Muslim or Christians, in Occupied Palestine or in “shattat” (diaspora) – are the center of the story, a better understanding of Palestine and its people can be established, and true solidarity can be offered.”

How should they unite around their national narrative? Simple, Baroud explains, “One major platform for their resistance, which strongly bonds Palestinians at home with those in shattat, is the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) movement, which pushes for accountability from those who make the Israeli domination over Palestine possible. It advocates for the Right of Return for Palestinian refugees, the end of occupation and equal rights for Palestinians who live in Israel.”

And so, according to him, “any solidarity that deviates from the current aspirations of Palestinians – as articulated by their fighting women and men, by their prisoners on hunger strikes, by their students fighting for the right to education, by these resilient, but often neglected voices – is not true solidarity.”

And so, in the best tradition of the French Royal House of Bourbon, the Arabs of the Land of Israel have forgotten nothing and learned nothing.